Detection of building radar footprints from single VHR SAR images

Abstract

The new advanced very high resolution (VHR) synthetic aperture radar (SAR) sensors are capable of achieving sub-meter resolution, which offers the opportunity for a fine level of analysis of man-made structures. In this paper, we present a method for the detection and 2-D reconstruction of building radar footprints from VHR SAR scenes. The method is based on the extraction of a set of low-level features from the image and on their composition to more structured primitives using a perceptual organization method. Based on the backscattering model of gable-roofed building, building candidates are firstly detected with a circular detector proposed in this paper, then roof edges are extracted by a line detector and radar footprints are finally reconstructed. Experimental results confirm that our algorithm performs well.